Shitty Wishbone Omens

February 17, 2010

If I was very superstitious I would be pretty bummed right now.

So we roasted a chicken a couple of weeks ago. When I stripped the carcass, I set the wishbone aside to dry so that we could wish on it later. My dad used to do this when I was a kid. The way this little ritual works is that 2 people make a wish, then each person wraps a pinkie around one prong of the V-shaped wishbone. When you both pull, the wishbone snaps unevenly, so that one person is holding a shorter piece, and the other has a long piece with the knob from the middle of the bone still attached. The person left holding the big piece is supposed to have their wish come true.

This afternoon I noticed the forgotten wishbone and figured it was dry enough. The boy and I made our wishes, held the bone in our pinkies, and pulled. Instead of breaking like it was supposed to, the bone broke into 3 pieces and the middle knob went flying across the kitchen. We were both left holding short pieces of bone– the losing, “wish denied” pieces.

“Fuuuuuck,” I sighed. “I think that was a bad sign. Uhh… Did you by any chance wish we would find jobs?”

“… Yeah,” said the boy.

“Me too. Dammit…”

So it’s official now. If there is a God, he probably hates us– Or his divine plan just happens to require the two of us to spend our lives as bitter, washed-up losers.